Drink Of The Week: Martinez

The Drink That's Even More Classic Than The Martini

The Martinez is boozy, sure, but is less so than modern martini recipes.

A little history with your buzz...

Here’s the skinny on the Martinez, the progenitor of the martini: It’s delicious. And annoying to research online, where competing histories collide like ice in a cocktail shaker. In frustration, we turned to Max Warner, Global Brand Ambassador for Plymouth gin. “The Martinez was — possibly — created in Martinez, California, in the late 1800s.” Key word: "Possibly."

But influence is more important than origin. “It’s the link between the Manhattan and the present-day martini,” Warner contends. “The Martinez, based on the Manhattan, substituted Old Tom gin for whisky.” That recipe saw print most famously in Jerry Thomas’ How To Make Drinks or the Bon Vivant’s Companion, in 1887. And according to Warner, a shift in bartender preference from sweet to dry vermouth allowed for the creation of the martini some 10 years later. (What a know-it-all, this guy.)

Hair-on-your-chest-factor: 82/100

The Martinez is boozy, sure, but is less so than modern martini recipes, which seem to regard vermouth (the lower proof ingredient) as something akin to mercury — fatal in all but the smallest doses. No, the status of this sweet, botanically charged drink comes from the knowledge it implies more than the wallop it packs. With a Martinez in hand, you tell the world you know a bit about cocktail culture. That's also a nice way of saying you should probably cut back — but what the hell.